The library's flowers are wilting

We have a fairly new part-time employee whose job title is "research assistant" but who in reality is a library assistant, with precious little in the way of research duties. She's student at an MLS program in the region, full of enthusiasm for the profession she seeks.

The other day she got very upset with me. I forget how the conversation started, but she noted that she is disappointed with the job because it's mostly boring stuff and doesn't involve any research or much other opportunity for creativity. Mind you, I didn't write the job proposal, I didn't interview her, and I don't supervise her, so her disappointment isn't my fault. Anyway, I responded by noting that the field is mostly about process, and not content. We help others do the creative stuff, but mostly we just keep the information process operating as smoothly as we can.

We then started talking in greater depth about the field. I told her what I see: around the country, libraries are cutting back, laying off staff, reducing hours, even closing libraries. That's true in all sorts of libraries: public, academic, law and special. I also mentioned what's happening to just about all the people in the field whom I know. There's gloom across the board.

And I mentioned what's happening to my library. Next year my institute moves to a new building; for most people here, that's good news ... but for us in the library, it's definitely not. We'll suffer nearly a 50% cut in space, drastic reductions in work space and working conditions, loss of all of our bound journals, loss of the vast majority of our reference works, and loss of nearly half of the rest of our collection. Indeed, I'm already spending a goodly share of my time disposing of books, and I'll be doing that throughout the coming year. (I have to add that it's very dispiriting to be whacking at a collection I had carefully built over the past dozen years.)

And no, the losses won't be made up by electronic resources. Much of it simply cannot be replaced that way, and in any case there's no promise of corresponding increases in funding so we can afford to switch to more intensive use of electronic resources ... and they don't come cheap! And no, the researchers dependent on the library won't have anywhere else to go.

I guess I sounded pretty dispirited.

Anyway, the research assistant got really upset with my "negativity" because she is "just entering the field" and doesn't want to hear anything negative about it! Sorry sister, but the library field is a declining and increasingly stressed field throughout; like I said, I don't know anybody in the field who doesn't have dismal tales to tell. And I don't know of any libraries where morale -- or funding, or workload, or job prospects -- are improving. It would be funny if it wasn't so sad. I suppose that I shouldn't be telling her about the weeding going on here and what it means for the collection, either, huh? Guess I shouldn't mention global warming or financial reform or the war in Afghanistan, either; just happy stories from here on out. Much better to be an ostrich.

It's not a good time to be a librarian. Wishful thinking won't help; the field is declining.

Do School Libraries Need Books?

The New York Times online op-ed page includes a feature entitled "Room for Debate: A Running Commentary on the News." Following on a news account of a prep school's decision to remove the books from its library, "Room for Debate" earlier this month asked the question "Do School Libraries Need Books?" Except for the head master of that school, the participants - authors, a professor and a school library director -- answered with a resounding "Yes."

Today's "Room for Debate" continues the discussion with "The Library, Through Students’ Eyes." In most cases, the educational level of the students queried wasn't given, which is too bad, but most read like high schoolers. Be that as it may, several participants echoed the oft-heard critique that books and the libraries that own them are obsolete. Like the similar critiques frequently given by those in positions of greater authority, the arguments have enormous holes in them.

One student wrote "Books are very expensive and schools could put that money toward many other investments such as charities, fund raisers, proms, etc." This chestnut probably requires little comment, although one is left wondering about this student's concept of schooling in general. The same student went on to state that "Students, such as [the writer] do use the Internet for nearly every assignment because of online encyclopedias/databases, online texts, blogs and other Web sites and search engines." Another extolled the currency of the electronic, stating that "Online research ... typically yields more up-to-date and accurate information than books," contrasting books with "online journal databases, JSTOR, etc., [which] are invaluable."

As a librarian in a library catering to scholarly researchers, I have a perspective that some of these students might lack. First of all, my researchers use both electronic and traditional print resources extensively. For example, about 19% of my book collection circulates annually, and interlibrary borrowing of books adds an effective 10% on top of that -- that's heavy usage. My online journals aren't accessed nearly as often (and aren't expected to be). Serious scholars continue to rely on books to a very significant degree. Perhaps surprisingly, many of the books my researchers use are comparatively old, too, although they're also interested in my new books.

Second, books aren't library budget busters. My annual book acquisition budget is far, far lower than my electronic journal and database budget. Any one of our more extensive online journal services and commercial databases (e.g., Academic OneFile, LexisNexis, SCOPUS) cost more than my entire book budget. And yes, those services, too, come from the library and its budget; they're not the product of the school administration waving a magic wand. Where the old library only acquired paper books and journals, the contemporary libary needs to do not only that, but subscribe to a host of expensive electronic resoruces. (Admittedly, space is a separate and costly issue, and sooner or later libraries face very difficult weeding decisions as a result.)

Third, some of these students' comments undermine their own arguments. For instance, one cited JSTOR as an example of an up-to-date resource ... and I've heard the very same assumption from many of my own library's patrons. Wrong! JSTOR is a wonderful resource, but it is archival and not current. Nor is it meant to be; for most journals covered by JSTOR, there's a five year moratorium; for almost all of the rest it's a three year moratorium. Even many of the journals covered by more current journal services, such as Academic OneFile and Academic Search Premier, are embargoed for several months or even a year. Woe to the researchers who assume that by searching JSTOR or other online services that they've located the current literature on a topic!

Moreover, some of these students' comments echo a common failing which most librarians (and faculty) must confront: students have great difficulty separating quality research material from the chaff freely available on the Internet. A simple question illustrates the problem: which source is more trustworthy and presents material which is more effectively vetted: a blog written by an unknown writer (such as me!) or a book or journal published by a major academic press? There is an enormous literature on this topic, but it all comes done to a single point: most students cannot effectively separate the wheat from the chaff on the Internet, and by relying on it instead of more traditional information sources make their research weaker, not stronger.

Lurking behind this entire debate is the issue of funding, and the frequent desire of administrators to pare back their budgets. Libraries look like easy targets, but the reality is that the advent of electronic resources is the principal engine driving up library costs, not books. Libraries need both if they are to serve the information needs of their patrons, and administrators ill serve their researchers by trying to skimp.

Who do you call when the fire station is burning?

Patron requests arrive via an automated HelpDesk ticket system. Said system was down this morning. Our library tech went to glorious leader to inform her of the problem. Her response: "Send a HelpDesk ticket."

Note: this was originally posted on ketches, yaks & hawks 17 November 2008

Delegation

Fearless Leader returned from fact-finding, having found that penurious budgets exist elsewhere, too. Useful information, that. And surprising.

Whereupon Fearless Leader decided her plate was too full, so the task of setting up new vendor contracts including serials (nonlibrarians are excused for tuning out; librarians for shuddering) should be transferred to moi. Sure, why not? Two days still remain until the new fiscal year, and reassignment of the tasks is yet to be accompanied by transference of the necessary information.

To compensate, I was relieved of a task that takes 30 seconds per day, and two of the four functions I had which I still enjoyed.

That decision having been made, F.L. retired to the staff kitchen for nearly an hour of serious schmoozing, followed by a "meeting" that consisted mostly of small talk and laughter (the walls are thin) that lasted almost to the end of the day.

More hard work, but that's why she gets the big bucks.

Note: this was originally posted on ketches, yaks & hawks 27 September 2008

How does one spell "junket"?

Fearless Leader is off next week on a four day fact-finding trip to a distant metropolis (where, coincidentally, she has family and friends) to meet with librarians at four universities to learn how libraries serve the needs of graduate programs. Apparently there are no libraries serving graduate programs in our own metropolitan region, AND her phone is broken. Hard work, but somebody's got to do it.

Note: this was originally posted on ketches, yaks & hawks 18 September 2008